Do Handicaps exist in Dirty Bomb? Should they?

(Xenithos) #1

I believe everyone on these forums knows the old joke about Dirty Bomb being more likely to kick your teeth in. And “Don’t be a Dick” which for some reason a lot of you punks just kinda are (guess telling players to play dirty and not be a dick doesn’t exactly go hand in hand).

However, in a recent thread, the following sentence was said and it inspired this thread!

I know no competitive game where low players have to play with high players. Except maybe Golf, because there is a “handicap”.
First off, I think the person that said this is wrong, because there are many sports, many competitive games, and many video games, where players just gotta play with worse than them, or better than them. In fact, all of life is about gaining wisdom and skills to better one-self. Take Martial Arts as an example. A student always learns moves from a master, the master rarely fights the student because it would be far too easy. After a student shows mastery over the beginning moves, the master counters them, but never intentionally hurts the student unless the student is arrogant and needs to be put into his place. After he shows the student that everything he just learned is useful, but has a counter, he then goes about teaching the student the counters. This continues until the student eventually becomes a master, and gets students of his own. Yes, we are all jedi.

Now, as the Title asks, do Handicaps exist in Dirty Bomb? Should they? Should new players be given Handicaps? If so, what would they be? More hp if under a certain level? Try Hard augment for free for first week of play? Maybe they get wallhax, rofl. Or should DB assign new players a mentor? No limits, but keep feasibility in mind, and just throw any idea that comes to you out there. Have fun!

(Melinder) #2

(Press E) #3

Granted I only skimmed through this, but there aren’t really any, at least not many worth mentioning. I wouldn’t consider grouping low level players together, pretty much every sport or game ever does that. I define a handicap as something that either gives you a benefit or impairment in order to balance you out with an opponent.

The only thing in DB I’d call a “handicap” that comes to mind is the tryhard augment, but it’s not like it’s used much or even that available. And it’s such a minor thing that I’ll still vote no handicaps.

And there definitely shouldn’t be any either. Handicaps are designed to allow high skill players to play against low skill players. But well, no matter what, it’s always better to match players with a similar skill level together instead. And not only that, it would disrupt gameplay too. Part of the draw to DB is the simplicity. Knowing exactly how many hits it takes for a certain merc to go down, etc. Changing that up would just harm everyone else.

The only handicap I might be okay with is a respawn time reduction for casual matches when a player is dying repeatedly. Considering a bad player won’t usually push with a team anyways, you might as well give them more time to learn the game instead of being stuck waiting for a timer the entire match. But even then, idk.

(Your worst knifemare.) #4

I guess technically having Arty on chapel is a handicap, but that’s about it.

#5

We are all equal at the starting line in the race called life; we are not all equal when we reach the finish line. People that want handicaps? Suck it up, buttercup.

(Xenithos) #6

Playing Devil’s avocado here: Would we call Hit beeps a handicap? You can’t aim the best so you gotta have sound to confirm? What about hit markers? Strictly under Starry’s definition these wouldn’t be handicaps, they’d be tools everyone has access to.

(TheStrangerous) #7

I guess some mercs are beginner friendly?
DB isn’t a game that panders to those with no aim. Unless I’m missing something…

#8

@Xenithos said:
Playing Devil’s avocado here: Would we call Hit beeps a handicap? You can’t aim the best so you gotta have sound to confirm? What about hit markers? Strictly under Starry’s definition these wouldn’t be handicaps, they’d be tools everyone has access to.

Yeah, you pretty much answered it yourself right there. It’s not a handicap if it affects everyone equally. Thinking aloud here, the only form of a handicap I’d be in favor of would be something like increasing the rate of Credits earned or Merc rentals in the earlier levels. This keeps beginners playing (more play time equates to more time for the beginners to get better) and gives them more of an arsenal to compete with. I don’t think any handicap that affects concrete statistics like damage or health is necessary or beneficial.

I tend to rant about these things a lot, but I swear this is like a psychological and sociological issue in today’s world rather than any game or sport’s fault. If you are playing a game with a lot of people, chances are you are not going to be the best player. This is especially true if you are new. If I go out in my town and want to play a game of pickup football at the park or some pond hockey, but I’m new and I suck, why is it anyone else’s fault? Should they all have to run slower and hit softer? Or should I continue to practice and play with people of my own skill level until I can hang with the big boys?

It’s all about a quick fix and instant gratification to people. I participated in ranked, gimme my goddamn shiny toy and skin despite me getting stomped every game! I play this game for fun and he keeps winning so this game is terrible! Gimme, gimme, gimme, and make me feel like I did good.

All right, that’s enough from me haha. Gonna call it a night.

(Press E) #9

@Wintergreen said:
It’s all about a quick fix and instant gratification to people. I participated in ranked, gimme my goddamn shiny toy and skin despite me getting stomped every game! I play this game for fun and he keeps winning so this game is terrible! Gimme, gimme, gimme, and make me feel like I did good.

I never really saw it as a way to get competitive rewards without working to get the skill, more like just giving one player an advantage over another so the two can play together in good fun without totally ruining the game.
And that’s why it’s out of place in dirty bomb anywhere outside of casual (well, in casual too really).

Imagine it like playing hide and seek with a friend who has issues walking, so you give them 10 extra seconds to hide when counting. It allows people to play together and have fun, even though under normal situations one person would always do better. It’s not about winning, it’s about playing the game and enjoying it when you can’t just pair two people with similar skills together. In an online game like DB you can easily match skills, so handicaps aren’t needed.

I’m super tired so maybe that’s a bad explanation, but oh well lol

(Teflon Love) #10

For new players, occasionally a blue shell should drop which automatically kills the top scorer in the other team. I hear this is really popular in Mario Kart.

(K1X455) #11
  • Being teamed up with a Skyhammer/Arty that don’t give ammo is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with a medic that doesn’t revive and go Rambo is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with an engineer on EV defence trying to establish ambush is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with a match thrower that destroys team deployables, suicides on artillery / air strikes / molotov is a handicap
(GatoCommodore) #12

add maximum level 20 server
there, the handicap to end all handicaps.

The Day of the handicaps

(Xenithos) #13

@teflonlove said:
For new players, occasionally a blue shell should drop which automatically kills the top scorer in the other team. I hear this is really popular in Mario Kart.

I couldnt fully tell if this was a joke or not, but either way I laughed.

Thanks for the responses guys!

(Xenithos) #14

@K1X455 said:

  • Being teamed up with a Skyhammer/Arty that don’t give ammo is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with a medic that doesn’t revive and go Rambo is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with an engineer on EV defence trying to establish ambush is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with a match thrower that destroys team deployables, suicides on artillery / air strikes / molotov is a handicap
    I never even thought to consider their lack of skill as a handicap to the team play… Man that’s deep. The handicap is that they’re useless so I’m less useful…
(Teflon Love) #15

@Xenithos said:

@teflonlove said:
For new players, occasionally a blue shell should drop which automatically kills the top scorer in the other team. I hear this is really popular in Mario Kart.

I couldnt fully tell if this was a joke or not, but either way I laughed.

It’s a joke. Here’s hoping SD hasn’t filed this as suggestion already.

Anyway, a couple of years ago Gamasutra had a quite in depth article on Learning to Love Handicaps in Competitive Games which concluded that if done right it can do a lot of good in bringing people of different skill level together and still having fun.

Maybe adding handicaps to casual servers but leaving ranked matches without handicaps might work.

(B_Montiel) #16

A handicap for team stacking the same Support or Combat merc would somehow give some incentive for diversity.
The easiest idea would be increase the ability cooldown by n% for all the player using the said stacked merc, or even have some shared cooldown system.

And it can also work for all other merc classes. Only Support and Combat are the most annoying when stacked. Any duo stack of fragger/arty/chose-the-one-you-put-in is a proper pain in the ass and ruin the diversity on some maps.

(pumpkinmeerkat) #17

aimpunch :’(

(K1X455) #18

@Xenithos said:

@K1X455 said:

  • Being teamed up with a Skyhammer/Arty that don’t give ammo is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with a medic that doesn’t revive and go Rambo is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with an engineer on EV defence trying to establish ambush is a handicap
  • Being teamed up with a match thrower that destroys team deployables, suicides on artillery / air strikes / molotov is a handicap
    I never even thought to consider their lack of skill as a handicap to the team play… Man that’s deep. The handicap is that they’re useless so I’m less useful…

It’s not the lack of skill, it’s being in a match with players with lack of skill. That’s a good players’ handicap.

(Da_Mummy) #19

@Xenithos said:
Take Martial Arts as an example. A student always learns moves from a master, the master rarely fights the student because it would be far too easy. After a student shows mastery over the beginning moves, the master counters them, but never intentionally hurts the student unless the student is arrogant and needs to be put into his place. After he shows the student that everything he just learned is useful, but has a counter, he then goes about teaching the student the counters. This continues until the student eventually becomes a master, and gets students of his own.

Well but in DB the teacher does hurt his student with Bullets to the face. I mean you can’t exactly call yourself a teacher if you just go all tissue paper with players that are probably all new. I am not considering these people a handicap because there is no right for me to claim I’m any better (my aim is still shitty and I play medic for a living so…).
Just consider them as another less reliable part of your team and you’ll be surprised how they turn out.

(Chris Mullins) #20

Having handicaps in game similar to golf would (I imagine) be like higher level players’ weapons would do less damage to lower level players and this would introduce a ton of strange experiences and variables.

I’d be curious to see what kind of things you would see implemented as handicaps, but generally, CMM should negate the need for any of this.